At least 114 people died after a boat carrying migrants sank off the Italian island of Lampedusa, officials said Thursday, in a devastating accident that is likely to stoke debate over illegal migration.

More people are feared missing, even after rescue workers brought in 155 survivors, the Health Ministry said. Some survivors said as many as 500 people were aboard the boat, according to the Lampedusa medical center.

An Italian coast guard spokeswoman said divers reaching the sunken boat found about 20 bodies around it, adding to 94 found earlier. Many more bodies were inside, she said, but divers didn't yet have a precise number.

A ship that may have been transporting as many as 500 migrants caught fire and sank near the Italian island of Lampedusa, killing dozens. WSJ's Christopher Emsden joins the News Hub with details. Photo: AP

The 66-foot boat sank after passengers started a fire to attract attention when the boat's motor failed, said Deputy Prime Minister Angelino Alfano. The fire spread out of control and the passengers moved to one side of the boat, causing it to flip, Mr. Alfano said. A passing vessel spotted the boat before dawn, triggering a frantic rescue effort, officials said.

A Lampedusa beach was lined with rows of covered corpses, television footage showed, with one local fisherman describing the sea as "full of bodies." Italian Prime Minister Enrico Letta declared Friday a national day of mourning.

The accident, among the worst in a series of such incidents in the Mediterranean, is likely to fuel discussion on illegal migration, a thorny issue in the European Union, where members retain national powers over how they manage their borders.

ENLARGE

The body of a migrant is unloaded from an Italian coast guard boat Thursday off the island of Lampedusa, located between Tunisia and Sicily.
European Pressphoto Agency

ENLARGE

The European Commission, the EU's executive, has pushed for shared methods and standards, as well as a common approach to migrants inside EU countries. Home Affairs Commissioner Cecilia Malmström, in a statement Thursday, called on the EU to "step up its effort to prevent these tragedies."

Most of the survivors were from Somalia and Eritrea, with some from Ghana, but had set sail from Libya, officials said.

Italy and Libya have long tried to enforce formal agreements aimed at preventing illegal migrants from leaving their countries of origin, with little success. Police on Thursday arrested a Tunisian citizen after other survivors identified him as a crew member.

Italy has rescued more than 16,000 migrants at sea this year, Mr. Alfano said, adding that he expected to address the issue soon with European Commission President José Manuel Barroso. "We'll speak loudly on this," Mr. Alfano said. "We want to talk about European frontiers, not Italian borders."

In recent years, thousands of Africans have piled into rickety vessels to round the often-stormy western bulge of Africa into Europe, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.

Others have sat atop trucks plowing through the vast Sahara, with the unlucky kidnapped, ransomed, or robbed. Local media in West Africa routinely carry stories of young teenagers who climb into the wheel wells of jets, hoping to land in foreign soil, only to freeze to death as the planes hit high altitudes.

Lampedusa's location between Tunisia and Sicily makes it a frequent landing point for refugees and migrants arriving from North Africa on boats that are often towed to land by Italian authorities. An additional 463 migrants arrived on the island on a different boat overnight. Earlier this week, 13 migrants died in a boat accident off the coast of Ragusa, a town in southern Sicily.

Somali presidential spokesman Abdirahman Omar Osman said the government was concerned about the large numbers of its youth risking their lives to get to Europe, but that the war-struck nation hasn't been able to stem the flow. "The young people inside Somalia who don't feel they have any hope in Somalia, feel that their only hope is to go to Europe," he said.

Mr. Osman said he was concerned that some European countries weren't granting asylum to people who risked their lives to get there. "Our concern is Italy not welcoming those who came as asylum seekers," he said.

In Eritrea, a small arid country along the Red Sea that is home to 6 million people, thousands flee every year amid the economic ruin and political repression President Isaias Afewerki has fostered since coming to power in 1991.

"People lose hope and they just run away," said Amanuel Eyasu, a journalist who fled from Eritrea to the U.K. in 2003, where he runs a website criticizing the government. "So these kind of disasters have become almost a daily occurrence now."

Tsehaye Fassil, an official in Eritrea's foreign ministry, referred a request for comment on Thursday's boat accident to a colleague, who didn't immediately respond.

Ghana's Deputy Information Minister Felix Ofusu said officials in his country were looking into whether the deaths included Ghanaians. In contrast to Somalia and Eritrea, Ghana is considered one of Africa's stars, with an economy growing at 7.8%, according to the International Monetary Fund.

Migrant Ship Sinks Off Italy

Photos

Body bags were lined up at the port of Lampedusa, Italy, on Thursday after a boat carrying asylum seekers caught fire and sank off the island. Reuters

Migrant arrivals to Lampedusa began surging a dozen years ago, notably from Libya, triggering a controversial bilateral accord under which Libya agreed to accept African immigrants deported from Italy. But the waves of incoming people outpaced the island's capacity to deal with them, and many were simply released or given written instructions to leave the country.

During the Arab Spring rebellions in Tunisia and Libya of 2011, more than 35,000 immigrants arrived on Lampedusa. Some 1,500 people died trying to cross the Mediterranean to Europe that year, according to the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, and other estimates are higher.

"These tragedies oblige us to find a way to avoid them," Italy's President Giorgio Napolitano said. He called for an overhaul of Italy's political-asylum laws, noting that many of those dying are fleeing from war-torn countries. But he also said it was an international problem that required "decision and action" from the EU as a whole.

Many Italian lawmakers lamented what they said was the absence of a stronger role for EU institutions in coping with illegal arrivals to the country's enormous coastline.

Italy's chronically poor preparation for migration surges spurs "asylum forum shopping," according to a new draft report from the Migration Committee of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. The committee said the absence of a clear system for receiving and processing migrants meant many arrivals preferred Italy as a destination point so they could continue on to neighboring countries.

Current European rules require the state where a migrant arrives to register his or her arrival, process an asylum request or arrange deportation. But the frequency of maritime incidents in the Mediterranean entailed "confusion and chaos" over just who is responsible, the committee noted.

Maybe a swap would be in order. Europeans to Africa and Africans to Europe. Africa has about 3 times the landmass of Europe. I'm sure Europeans can make something of the vast natural resources which the Africans cannot. Also the climate is better in Africa.

Perhaps the Italians and the EU can get lessons from the WSJ ,Obama and Juan RINO McCain on accepting millions of illegals and remembering when mere thousands were considered a problem. I'm thinking policies of serial amnesties will really move them into the current decade with a goal of 3rd world wages achievable with just enough lawlessness.

Horrible accident, yet why does the reporter think that it is "likely to stoke debate over illegal migration"? What good can come to Italy by accepting boatload after boatload of refugees (or non-refugees)?

Mr. Osman clearly has been well briefed on what comments will resonate well with Western leftists when he expresses concern that the Italians aren't granting asylum willingly enough. The Europeans, however, could learn from the Australians how to deal with illegals arriving by boat, where to site detention facilities, and how to rapidly expedite deportation. Better yet, they could study the methods of some of the nations that practice the religion of peace, tolerance, and love, such as Bahrain, on the proper treatment of migrants.

While this is a tragic event, all survivors should be returned to Africa from Italy immediately. These illegal people are not Italy's responsibility. Italy has massive troubles of its own without the crushing weight of scores of immigrants.

Why doesn't the pope criticize the war-torn African dictatorships that make life miserable and unsafe for their own citizens? The misery and danger is so great that these poor, desperate people feel compelled to risk their lives to escape. The island of Lampedusa is doing the best it can with the influx of illegal immigrants for whom it has no responsibility.

These are people fleeing failed States. Wonder if Susan Power and her boss will voice their outrage at the conditions in these countries, blame them for the disaster, and advocate the use of force against the controlling powers in these countries? Or will this be ignored? Methinks the latter.

I have never understood how any rational person could argue or assert that it is Italy's (or any other European nation's) fault that these poor African migrants are risking and then losing their lives in unseaworthy vessels and watercraft to make journeys to Europe. No one in Europe is forcing these people to flee their home countries, much less to do so in dangerous vessels; that is the result of failures of these migrants' home states due to political corruption, endemic wars, extreme poverty, etc. It's time that Europe make it clear that such migration will not be tolerated. Only such action by the EU will slow down and possibly stop such illegal and stupid attempts to migrate into Europe.

The media admits that 500 people were packed onto this rustbucket sea-tub, but the media blames Italy.

The human traffickers who sent an overloaded ship on a dangerous and illegal trip, while collecting $1000's of dollars from everyone, are the bad guys, not Italy. Italy certainly doesn't need more North African criminals roaming, raping and robbing on its streets.

Not our problem. Really.....this is not our concern at all. Of course if they make it to CA, they can get a drivers license, then vote, then get free money from the socialist govt. Then it would be our concern. What is this kind of article doing in the WSJ?

Despite what the people said about Italy we r doing our best in order to help and assist all migrants but we are alone, just Italy we dont have any kind of help from others country (did u ever read something about Malta ?) or from the EU (U.N or similar)...

Absolutely correct. Some of the survivors may indeed be the islamic suicide bombers of tomorrow. The article omits mentioning that the cult behind much of the unrest in these countries is islam, and what wonderful citizens they make.

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